By Rebekah Hanley*
Large language models (“LLMs”), which are a form of generative artificial intelligence (“AI”), present a tremendous opportunity for legal writing faculty. Thanks to generative AI, the tools and processes for creating professional writing are evolving dramatically, offering educators a chance to rethink longstanding practices. That’s a gift. Generative AI can help breathe new life into tired material. It can prompt playful invention that pays large dividends in both professional development and student learning.
But a big change, like the introduction of powerful new technology, also brings into focus a serious responsibility—a duty to update legal education for the new era. And that duty extends far beyond the legal writing faculty. That duty is shared by the legal writing faculty’s casebook colleagues and law school administrators.
This Article begins to imagine the bold moves that law schools might make to capitalize on the paradigm shift triggered by LLMs. Because LLMs are predicted to reshape legal practice, they deserve a prominent position in the JD curriculum, which aims to prepare today’s students to become tomorrow’s lawyers. But because LLMs capably mimic human analysis and writing, many legal educators quickly categorized them as threats—sources of shortcuts that would necessarily undermine the acquisition of the knowledge, skill, and judgment essential for to professional preparation. LLMs prompted denial, fear, worry, and overwhelm among legal educators. The technology also sparked controversy: some educators pursued a cautious embrace of LLMs, while others insisted that any student use of the technology was tantamount to cheating.
Instead of dragging feet or fighting an inevitable force, law school faculty and leaders should proactively and creatively incorporate LLMs into courses across the law school curriculum—leveraging the technology’s strengths while also modeling the caution, critical analysis, and flexibility that legal work requires. This Article explores how LLMs might be integrated into the JD curriculum along with additional pedagogical shifts indicated by the rise of generative AI.